Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 26 Jan 2000

Vol. 513 No. 1

Written Answers. - Community Care.

Bernard Allen

Ceist:

392 Mr. Allen asked the Minister for Health and Children if he will review the policy of discharging more patients to community care in view of the fact that, in many cases, community care is not appropriate and results in a situation whereby a high number of ex-psychiatric patients are homeless and a high number of psychiatrically ill people end up in prison. [1152/00]

Minister for Health and Children (Mr. Cowen):

Planning for the Future, published in 1984, recommended that psychiatric care should be primarily community oriented, and that there should be a shift from the psychiatric hospital being the focal point of the mental health services. Successive Governments have pursued this policy and the shift from an institutional setting to a community-based setting has resulted in many improvements in our mental health services.

The aim at all times is to provide each individual patient with the best possible care in the most appropriate setting. Community care is not always the most suitable method of care and in a small number of cases long-term inpatient treat ment is required. The discharge of any patient from a psychiatric hospital is a clinical decision and patients are only discharged when their clinical condition warrants it. Care is taken to ensure that homeless patients are not discharged without appropriate alternative accommodation being available to them.

There appears to be no evidence to attribute the relatively high degree of psychiatric illness among the prison population to the shift to a community based mental health service. Additional funding has been made available to the health boards this year for substantial improvements in the forensic psychiatric services.